The Future of Consumerist

Over the last twelve years, Consumerist has been a steadfast proponent and voice on behalf of consumers, from exposing shady practices by secretive cable companies to pushing for action against dodgy payday lenders. Now, we’re joining forces with Consumer Reports, our parent organization, to cultivate the next generation of consumer advocacy.

Stay tuned as Consumerist’s current and future content finds its home as a part of the Consumer Reports brand. In the meantime, you can access existing Consumerist content below, and we encourage you to visit Consumer Reports to read the latest consumer news.

A suspected credit-card thief was caught thanks to the quick thinking of a cashier at a beauty-supply store in Florida. He didn’t quite feel comfortable with the purchase, and the customer didn’t have any photo identification on her that matched the name on the card. Instead of turning the customer away, he asked her to pose for a photo while holding up the card. She did. [More]

Ever since the FDA and Congress started asking Johnson & Johnson to explain why it keeps recalling medicine, there have been references to an unpublicized “recall” that happened in November 2008. Last month, at a hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, a J&J executive swore that the company didn’t mean to mislead anyone. It turns out that wasn’t exactly accurate: Bloomberg has obtained emails from J&J’s company, McNeil Consumer Healthcare, that show executives knew the secret recall would trigger an FDA reaction if the agency got wind of its full scope. [More]

Here’s another “I bought a box of rocks!” story, only this time there’s proof that the victim wasn’t pulling a dirty trick on Walmart. Instead, it was someone before her who bought and then returned a Nintendo DS, only they swapped out the unit with rocks before making the return.

Want to see what a secret shopper scam actually looks like? Tracey sent us scans of the one that arrived in her mailbox today. It included a letter printed on cut-and-paste letterhead, a form, and a check for $4,200. The idea behind this sort of scam—also called an advance fee fraud or wire transfer scam—is to get the victim to deposit the check, wait for it to clear, then wire back the bulk of the money. Weeks or months later, the check will turn out to be fake, and by law the victim owes the bank for the full amount of the check.

Oh Comcast, you romantic. You were so sorry to see Michal leave that you pretended he didn’t. We get it: he bikes, he blogs, he helps toddlers learn Polish. But after four months of him repeatedly asking you to stop billing him, when you still won’t stop it begins to look a little stalker-ish. Your computers can’t always be down.

A woman sued Wachovia last year because it allowed a telemarketing scam company to process stolen payments through its banks, despite complaints from customers and warnings from other banks and federal authorities. Wachovia said it had no idea what was going on, but now documents have been revealed that prove people high up in the company not only knew, but that “the bank, in fact, solicited business from companies it knew had been accused of telemarketing crimes.” Why? How about millions of dollars of extra revenue from steep fees whenever a fraud-related chargeback went through? The lawyers for the woman are now seeking class-action status for the lawsuit.

Part of

Founded in 2005, Consumerist® is an independent source of consumer news and information published by Consumer Media LLC, a not-for-profit subsidiary of Consumer Reports.